6 ms·

It depends upon how you define "success." I visit California regularly, and since the new minimum wage law went into effect, I've noticed reduced hours, reduce

It depends upon how you define "success." I visit California regularly, and since the new minimum wage law went into effect, I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices. So now my normal breakfast spot isn't open when I want to go there, so I eat at home. The places I visit when they are open are mostly empty, because the customers don't want to wait longer and/or pay higher prices. So aside from the fewer employees getting a raise, the businesses are now under financial stress because of the reduced revenue, the customers have fewer options for where to eat, and the State of California and the local city/county governments will receive less tax revenue from these restaurants. Like most of the other recent California legislation, it's a "success" at further damaging the local economy and encouraging people like myself to stay away.

nxobject 1y ago
Was your normal breakfast spot subject to AB 1228 regulations?
- anonymousiam 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - tossandthrow 1y ago
    Ofcause it is unpopular. In the context you are literally complaining that you can not get your favorite breakfast because some people need to get less slave like wages. That should be wildly unpopular to utter. And yes, you have a side comment about job reductions, but it still misses the broader picture: some people can barely feed themselves.
    - anonymousiam 1y ago
      Restaurants have a lot of competition, and low margins. Like any other employer, they can offer jobs at low wages (or at least could, until the government got involved). People are under no obligation to accept a job with low wages, but some do. By definition the employees are not slaves, because they can quit at any time. Employers offer wages that the labor market will bear. Some jobs are mostly unskilled labor, and the pay is appropriate. Restaurant workers get tips, and I am usually very generous. Apparently tipping has become much less popular lately. Notable exceptions to skill vs. wages include things like the Longshoremen in the Port of Los Angeles, who belong to a union that extorts the shipping industry. There is no justification whatsoever for the high salaries they earn.
      - tossandthrow 1y ago
        > People are under no obligation to accept a job with low wages. This is the wrong premise you are basing your entire conviction on. When you don't have an alternative to working then it is not a jobmarket as you are not in a position do not transact. This is the same reason why the housingmarket is not a market the second people do not have alternatives to buy into overpriced rents. A free market requires that participants can decide not to transact. A pro-market government makes sure that this is is the case to a reasonable extend.
simoncion 1y ago
Is your normal breakfast spot a fast food joint? If it is not, it is my understanding that is not affected by the "higher minimum wages for fast food workers" regulation. If it is a fast food joint... well, I can't speak for all of California, but the fast food places in the section of San Francisco that I live (and roam around) in seem to have a reasonably healthy amount of customers in them. Perhaps things are different where you are, but I've noticed food getting markedly more expensive, have heard of commercial rents getting higher and higher, and have heard that many of the folks who would have done waitstaff jobs have decided to fuck off for places that were (at the time, if not now) less expensive than California. Oh, and there was the whole "flight from the expensive cities because WFH means that many folks don't have to tie themselves to an expensive, small apartment in a city they don't really like" thing a while back that gutted the downtowns (and leisure districts) of some-to-many big cities because -like- many folks exercised their new option to leave and left. Were it me, I'd consider blaming factors like those before I blamed modest increases in wages.
- underdown 1y ago
  Labor is typically ~33% of a restaurants costs.
- cosmic_cheese 1y ago
  I’d point to savings-driven relocation as well. It’s why some suburban towns have seen an increase in number of restaurants even as options in cities decline. If the desire is to reverse that trend, the best way to move the needle is to bring housing prices (by far the largest living expense) in cities back down to earth so they’re affordable to normal people again, however that’s best done (probably building more housing, unlike SF which decided to instead prioritize offices and retail, leaving it vulnerable when the pandemic hit).
m000 1y ago
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- inglor_cz 1y ago
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  - m000 1y ago
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    - inglor_cz 1y ago
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- Ray20 1y ago
  But this is more like a return of slavery, not its abolition. It is like when slavery was abolished, someone would protest against it, arguing that slavery cannot be abolished, since the masters feeds their slaves, takes care of them, treats and educates them, and if slavery is abolished, the standard of living of former slaves will fall sharply.
DarkNova6 1y ago
This only makes sense if staffing is a major cost factor, which it isn't.
- MarkusQ 1y ago
  It is. Typically over 30%, higher in fast food. https://www.5out.io/post/a-detailed-breakdown-of-restaurant-operating-costs https://www.5out.io/post/a-detailed-breakdown-of-restaurant-...
Uvix 1y ago
> I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices. That's not exclusive to California - my state didn't have a similar minimum wage law but they have the same changes in their restaurants. The bad news is, I basically stopped going out because I couldn't rely on businesses being open when I wanted to go. The good news is, I've lost a lot of weight from not going out.
gopher_space 1y ago
You need to factor rent increases into your thinking, both commercial and residential. Your breakfast spot is a business that no longer makes financial sense to operate. Feed the location of a business into a trip planner and note every neighborhood within reasonable commute radius. Calculate the average cost of renting a room in these areas and then multiply by three. That's your de facto minimum wage because you have no applicant pool beneath it. Adding on to this, your competitors in a better financial position are all paying well above minimum. There's probably a McDonalds across the street starting people at five bucks an hour more than you, and they have that wage plastered on a banner right out front.
- anonymousiam 1y ago
  If everything you wrote above is true (and I have no reason to believe otherwise), then the labor market should self adjust to the local economy and the government shouldn't need to step in and dictate a minimum wage.
benbayard 1y ago
Is your usual breakfast spot a location with more than 60 locations? The minimum wage increase here only applied to chains with more than 60 locations. A lot of what you're describing is nation-wide. Food is more expensive everywhere. Cost of living in California is up significantly. Rents for restaurants is significantly higher as well (at least anecdotally, my wife's family restaurant has to close because they doubled the rent after their lease was up, I have heard this is incredible common). This study by UC Berkeley attributed a 3.7% increase in food price because of the minimum wage changes. It's quite likely that food overall getting more expensive is responsible for a lot of what you're seeing. If we can't afford to pay people in California a wage where they can live here, then maybe the economy overall isn't sustainable? A $20 minimum wage is like $2800 take home per month and in many places that can barely cover rent.
- mensetmanusman 1y ago
  The property tax laws need to force people to maybe not sit in large empty houses.
  - anonymousiam 1y ago
    Why, if you have the money, should you be forced to have roommates or tenants? What sort of freedom is that?
    - jaggederest 1y ago
      If you have the money the taxes should be no problem, surely?
      - kriops 1y ago
        Taxes are only ever a problem if you have money … or something equivalent.
      - alsetmusic 1y ago
        The problem is a California tax law that lets home owners pay the tax rate from when they bought the home despite the value increasing. It disincentives selling. Which leads to retirees sitting on family homes rather than relocating and releasing them back into the market.
runako 1y ago
> I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices Anecdotally, this also describes how things have played out in the South generally. (Southern states generally have no set minimum wage, so they mostly default to the $7.25/hr set in 2009.) Perhaps this is different in other regions? I have similarly stopped going to most "fast" food restaurants because the waits are interminable. This is in states where an hour of minimum-wage labor will not gross you enough money to buy a pound of store-brand ground beef. It's not the wage.
- xienze 1y ago
  > Southern states generally have no set minimum wage, so they mostly default to the $7.25/hr set in 2009. You may be shocked to learn this, but just because they follow the minimum wage doesn’t mean companies are _actually_ paying minimum wage. Even in my southeastern state, McDonald’s is paying $12/hour. Why? Because there’s no takers, even in a LCOL area, at $7.25/hour! That’s why all this handwringing over the federal is so stupid. Local labor markets will dictate what an acceptable wage is.
  - runako 1y ago
    That's great, I live in a HCOL area in a Southern state and McDonald's here also pays higher than federal minimum. BUT in other parts of the state, especially rural areas, there are definitely jobs advertised for < $8/hr. In those areas, McDonald's is paying a premium wage compared to Local Burger Joint. McDonald's pays $12/hr so they can get a higher caliber of employee than Local Burger Joint. Neither pay as much as Perdue. > what an acceptable wage is We agree on this, but probably on what factors go into making a wage "acceptable" and the degree to which taxpayers in other parts of the state/country should have to subsidize those wages/owners' profits via social support programs. (I understand there is a third group of people who don't really care if the working poor are able to eat, but in the spirit of charity I do not assume anybody willing to engage in discourse is in that group.)
littlestymaar 1y ago
> since the new minimum wage law went into effect, I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices. The problem with that line of reasoning is that in the meantime: - unemployment has declined, which means it's harder to find people wanting to work in such a place. - inflation has kicked in, raising prices over the board. In that context, attributing the changes you've seen to a particular policy is very very hard (and the linked paper doesn't do a better job than what you do here…).
- anonymousiam 1y ago
  Most of those in favor of the government interference cite the points that you made. They don't really ring true though. Inflation has slowed, but the changes in the restaurants were sudden, and coincided with the new wage law.
  - littlestymaar 1y ago
    > Most of those in favor of the government interference The government doesn't interfere, it intervenes. > but the changes in the restaurants were sudden, and coincided with the new wage law. Says who? Even the paper doesn't claim such a sudden behavior. Also, the paper makes no attempt at estimating the effect of these confounders.

nxobject 1y ago

Was your normal breakfast spot subject to AB 1228 regulations?

anonymousiam 1y ago
[flagged]
- tossandthrow 1y ago
  Ofcause it is unpopular. In the context you are literally complaining that you can not get your favorite breakfast because some people need to get less slave like wages. That should be wildly unpopular to utter. And yes, you have a side comment about job reductions, but it still misses the broader picture: some people can barely feed themselves.
  - anonymousiam 1y ago
    Restaurants have a lot of competition, and low margins. Like any other employer, they can offer jobs at low wages (or at least could, until the government got involved). People are under no obligation to accept a job with low wages, but some do. By definition the employees are not slaves, because they can quit at any time. Employers offer wages that the labor market will bear. Some jobs are mostly unskilled labor, and the pay is appropriate. Restaurant workers get tips, and I am usually very generous. Apparently tipping has become much less popular lately. Notable exceptions to skill vs. wages include things like the Longshoremen in the Port of Los Angeles, who belong to a union that extorts the shipping industry. There is no justification whatsoever for the high salaries they earn.
    - tossandthrow 1y ago
      > People are under no obligation to accept a job with low wages. This is the wrong premise you are basing your entire conviction on. When you don't have an alternative to working then it is not a jobmarket as you are not in a position do not transact. This is the same reason why the housingmarket is not a market the second people do not have alternatives to buy into overpriced rents. A free market requires that participants can decide not to transact. A pro-market government makes sure that this is is the case to a reasonable extend.

simoncion 1y ago

Is your normal breakfast spot a fast food joint? If it is not, it is my understanding that is not affected by the "higher minimum wages for fast food workers" regulation. If it is a fast food joint... well, I can't speak for all of California, but the fast food places in the section of San Francisco that I live (and roam around) in seem to have a reasonably healthy amount of customers in them. Perhaps things are different where you are, but I've noticed food getting markedly more expensive, have heard of commercial rents getting higher and higher, and have heard that many of the folks who would have done waitstaff jobs have decided to fuck off for places that were (at the time, if not now) less expensive than California. Oh, and there was the whole "flight from the expensive cities because WFH means that many folks don't have to tie themselves to an expensive, small apartment in a city they don't really like" thing a while back that gutted the downtowns (and leisure districts) of some-to-many big cities because -like- many folks exercised their new option to leave and left. Were it me, I'd consider blaming factors like those before I blamed modest increases in wages.

underdown 1y ago
Labor is typically ~33% of a restaurants costs.
cosmic_cheese 1y ago
I’d point to savings-driven relocation as well. It’s why some suburban towns have seen an increase in number of restaurants even as options in cities decline. If the desire is to reverse that trend, the best way to move the needle is to bring housing prices (by far the largest living expense) in cities back down to earth so they’re affordable to normal people again, however that’s best done (probably building more housing, unlike SF which decided to instead prioritize offices and retail, leaving it vulnerable when the pandemic hit).

m000 1y ago

[flagged]

inglor_cz 1y ago
[flagged]
- m000 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - inglor_cz 1y ago
    [flagged]
Ray20 1y ago
But this is more like a return of slavery, not its abolition. It is like when slavery was abolished, someone would protest against it, arguing that slavery cannot be abolished, since the masters feeds their slaves, takes care of them, treats and educates them, and if slavery is abolished, the standard of living of former slaves will fall sharply.

DarkNova6 1y ago

This only makes sense if staffing is a major cost factor, which it isn't.

MarkusQ 1y ago
It is. Typically over 30%, higher in fast food. https://www.5out.io/post/a-detailed-breakdown-of-restaurant-operating-costs https://www.5out.io/post/a-detailed-breakdown-of-restaurant-...

Uvix 1y ago

> I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices. That's not exclusive to California - my state didn't have a similar minimum wage law but they have the same changes in their restaurants. The bad news is, I basically stopped going out because I couldn't rely on businesses being open when I wanted to go. The good news is, I've lost a lot of weight from not going out.

gopher_space 1y ago

You need to factor rent increases into your thinking, both commercial and residential. Your breakfast spot is a business that no longer makes financial sense to operate. Feed the location of a business into a trip planner and note every neighborhood within reasonable commute radius. Calculate the average cost of renting a room in these areas and then multiply by three. That's your de facto minimum wage because you have no applicant pool beneath it. Adding on to this, your competitors in a better financial position are all paying well above minimum. There's probably a McDonalds across the street starting people at five bucks an hour more than you, and they have that wage plastered on a banner right out front.

anonymousiam 1y ago
If everything you wrote above is true (and I have no reason to believe otherwise), then the labor market should self adjust to the local economy and the government shouldn't need to step in and dictate a minimum wage.

benbayard 1y ago

Is your usual breakfast spot a location with more than 60 locations? The minimum wage increase here only applied to chains with more than 60 locations. A lot of what you're describing is nation-wide. Food is more expensive everywhere. Cost of living in California is up significantly. Rents for restaurants is significantly higher as well (at least anecdotally, my wife's family restaurant has to close because they doubled the rent after their lease was up, I have heard this is incredible common). This study by UC Berkeley attributed a 3.7% increase in food price because of the minimum wage changes. It's quite likely that food overall getting more expensive is responsible for a lot of what you're seeing. If we can't afford to pay people in California a wage where they can live here, then maybe the economy overall isn't sustainable? A $20 minimum wage is like $2800 take home per month and in many places that can barely cover rent.

mensetmanusman 1y ago
The property tax laws need to force people to maybe not sit in large empty houses.
- anonymousiam 1y ago
  Why, if you have the money, should you be forced to have roommates or tenants? What sort of freedom is that?
  - jaggederest 1y ago
    If you have the money the taxes should be no problem, surely?
    - kriops 1y ago
      Taxes are only ever a problem if you have money … or something equivalent.
    - alsetmusic 1y ago
      The problem is a California tax law that lets home owners pay the tax rate from when they bought the home despite the value increasing. It disincentives selling. Which leads to retirees sitting on family homes rather than relocating and releasing them back into the market.

runako 1y ago

> I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices Anecdotally, this also describes how things have played out in the South generally. (Southern states generally have no set minimum wage, so they mostly default to the $7.25/hr set in 2009.) Perhaps this is different in other regions? I have similarly stopped going to most "fast" food restaurants because the waits are interminable. This is in states where an hour of minimum-wage labor will not gross you enough money to buy a pound of store-brand ground beef. It's not the wage.

xienze 1y ago
> Southern states generally have no set minimum wage, so they mostly default to the $7.25/hr set in 2009. You may be shocked to learn this, but just because they follow the minimum wage doesn’t mean companies are _actually_ paying minimum wage. Even in my southeastern state, McDonald’s is paying $12/hour. Why? Because there’s no takers, even in a LCOL area, at $7.25/hour! That’s why all this handwringing over the federal is so stupid. Local labor markets will dictate what an acceptable wage is.
- runako 1y ago
  That's great, I live in a HCOL area in a Southern state and McDonald's here also pays higher than federal minimum. BUT in other parts of the state, especially rural areas, there are definitely jobs advertised for < $8/hr. In those areas, McDonald's is paying a premium wage compared to Local Burger Joint. McDonald's pays $12/hr so they can get a higher caliber of employee than Local Burger Joint. Neither pay as much as Perdue. > what an acceptable wage is We agree on this, but probably on what factors go into making a wage "acceptable" and the degree to which taxpayers in other parts of the state/country should have to subsidize those wages/owners' profits via social support programs. (I understand there is a third group of people who don't really care if the working poor are able to eat, but in the spirit of charity I do not assume anybody willing to engage in discourse is in that group.)

littlestymaar 1y ago

> since the new minimum wage law went into effect, I've noticed reduced hours, reduced staff, and increased prices. The problem with that line of reasoning is that in the meantime: - unemployment has declined, which means it's harder to find people wanting to work in such a place. - inflation has kicked in, raising prices over the board. In that context, attributing the changes you've seen to a particular policy is very very hard (and the linked paper doesn't do a better job than what you do here…).

anonymousiam 1y ago
Most of those in favor of the government interference cite the points that you made. They don't really ring true though. Inflation has slowed, but the changes in the restaurants were sudden, and coincided with the new wage law.
- littlestymaar 1y ago
  > Most of those in favor of the government interference The government doesn't interfere, it intervenes. > but the changes in the restaurants were sudden, and coincided with the new wage law. Says who? Even the paper doesn't claim such a sudden behavior. Also, the paper makes no attempt at estimating the effect of these confounders.